After a classified briefing on TikTok, Senate Commerce Committee Chair Maria Cantwell says that “the next steps might be something more public, like a hearing”
- But Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has not committed to putting the bill on the floor anytime soon.
Cantwell’s indication that the process could move into public view matters because the Commerce Committee can elevate the issue even while Senate leadership leaves the bill’s floor path unresolved.
First-order effects
The Senate Commerce Committee may shift part of its TikTok deliberation from classified briefings to a public hearing, creating a visible forum for lawmakers’ concerns.
TikTok and bill supporters remain without a clear Senate floor timetable because Schumer has not committed to bringing the measure up.
Second-order effects
A public hearing would give senators a way to test and publicize the case for divestiture without first securing the votes or scheduling needed for floor action.
The move could increase scrutiny of TikTok’s arguments and operations, while leaving the Senate’s procedural bottleneck with leadership rather than the committee.
Third-order effects
If classified briefings are followed by public committee proceedings but not floor votes, national-security technology legislation may increasingly advance through oversight pressure before it reaches a decisive legislative stage.
The episode underscores that committee attention alone does not determine outcomes for major platform measures; leadership control of floor time remains the key institutional constraint.
The trend: TikTok policy is becoming a test of whether national-security concerns can translate from closed congressional briefings into a public, floor-ready legislative coalition.
Real news from this story is Sen Cantwell's commitment to meet with @RepGallagher and this quote: “We're gonna get it done. And we're not going to take forever.” Momentum in the world's greatest deliberative body is growing. https://www.nbcnews.com/...
Some senators who left the intel briefing on TikTok were fired up and wanted Senate floor action ASAP, but most want it to go through the committee process. So that's what I would bet on next.
We should seek—and I am thrilled to see Tai seeking—greater balance in trade, the peace that falls between the extremes, avoiding the 20th century tendency to take every notion (like interdependence) beyond its logical endpoint to something unstable and extreme dependence.
This is only part of the piece, above, but I will say given my twitter friend crowd, be wary of the ways in which the First Amendment is increasingly rhetorically serving globalizing capital interests. Moving from libertarian to neoliberal.
I've warning of the threat of tech-enabled global influence campaigns since I was a baby law professor in 2009. And I went around talking Foreign Emoluments with anyone who would listen in 2016, 2017, 2018. We should understand the TikTok effort as part of the same piece.
Me on TikTok: the idea that we must enact barriers to foreign-government surveillance and political interference is actually a very old one, embedded in both American history and the logic of democratic self-determination. https://www.theatlantic.com/ ...
“...includes communications infrastructure. Limits on foreign ownership have been a part of federal communications policy for more than a century. The Radio Act of 1912...” Great piece by @ZephyrTeachout today. Yes, ownership and control of media matters. https://www.theatlantic.…
“Forbidding a hostile foreign power from controlling a major communication platform fits into a long and important tradition of American self-government,” @ZephyrTeachout writes: https://www.theatlantic.com/ ...
Critics of the TikTok Bill Are Missing the Point - “Forbidding a hostile foreign power from controlling a major communication platform fits into a long and important tradition of American self-government,” @ZephyrTeachout writes: https://www.theatlantic.com/ ...
“The idea that we must enact barriers to foreign-government surveillance and political interference is actually a very old one, embedded in both American history and the logic of democratic self-determination” Compelling piece from @ZephyrTeachout https://www.theatlantic.com/ .…